Humanoids from the Deep (1980)

From The Caverns Of The Deep... It Strikes!

A small fishing community is split over the development of a cannery which opponents say will lead to the decimation of fish stocks and environmental degradation. Local First Nations are preparing a struggle against the cannery through the courts. Meanwhile, a militant and bigoted pro-cannery gang plan to make sure that the development goes ahead as planned regardless of the cost or the opposition.

What nobody knows is that the company behind the cannery has been engaging in dangerous experiments with genetic modification under an apparently feeble set of safety guidelines. As a result, a new species of amphibious humanoids has developed and rapidly evolved into a dangerous force. Now they are bent on destroying their human neighbours in order to claim the surrounding territory for themselves. Worse yet, they seek to impregnate human females in an alleged effort to speed up their evolutionary process.

Johnny Eagle (Anthony Penya), Dr. Susan Drake (Ann Turkel), Jim Hill (Doug McClure), and Tommy Hill (Breck Constin), to save the village from the mutants, and show the human villains the error of their ways.

Humanoids from the Deep (aka Monster) is actually a decently made and entertaining sci-fi horror film. The monsters are really cool looking and a lot of the make up is well done as well. The acting is reasonable and no, Tommy is not played by Mark Hamill even if it looks and sounds like he is.

Politically this one is interesting. The film obviously comments upon issues surrounding the over-exploitation of natural resources, environmental degradation, racism, Aboriginal rights, and sexism.

That last point might be the one point of contention on account of the unnecessary monster rape scenes which were obviously added for sensationalism alone since they are not necessary to the plot, and the notion that the monsters are consciously breeding with humans in order to further their evolutionary development is both a little unbelievable and probably very scientifically unsound. Meanwhile the film satirizes sexist treatment of women throughout making a mockery of backwards notions. Of course the final scene may very much have been an end in itself for the monster sex attack scenes. Without spoiling it, the final scene was more or less redone just a few years later in a much more famous film and with an even more terrifying effect.

The film was remade as a toned down TV movie in 1996.

4 humanoids out of 5
Contains violence, nudity, sexuality, language.

Black Sheep (2006)

There are 40 million sheep in New Zealand... and they're pissed off!

Harry Olfield's calm and ordinary childhood as the son of a sheep farmer was met with tragedy when his father died in a freak accident. Fifteen years, and numerous sheep-phobia sessions later, Harry has returned to the family farm. But things have changed back home while he has been away. His greedy and selfish brother, Angus, is now running the show and is looking to buy Harry out.

But Harry soon finds out that Angus has more in mind than just simple, old fashioned sheep farming. Angus has found a more profitable business model; genetic engineering. Using human DNA he has created what he believes will be a superior sheep. But when animal rights activists accidentally unleash a mutant sheep foetus into the wild serious trouble starts to brew.

When I first started watching Black Sheep I was pretty sure it was going to be awfully baaad. Then it turned out not the be so baaad after all. Baaad. But seriously... Black Sheep is a slapstick gore-fest in the tradition of Peter Jackson's similarly New Zealand-esque splatter films; Bad Taste, and Dead Alive (aka Brain Dead). It comes off as pretty stupid at first glance. That's because it is. I mean, it IS a movie about rampaging sheep after all. At the same time, it's redeeming factors are in the fact that it is funny, it has something to say (kind of), and it successfully piles on the nasty gore and a couple of jumps for good measure.

The message of the movie seems clearly to be that genetically modifying animals and food is probably a poor idea. Fair enough. It hammers this point home with buckets of fake blood, vicious zombie livestock, and mutant sheep-people. On the other hand, it also takes the piss out of environmentalists and animal rights activists by unfairly depicting them all as irresponsible, obnoxious, hippies.

Unfortunately this almost obliterates the effectiveness of the films message by refusing to actually take a side on the types of actions that the film insinuates criticism of and depicting those who work against such actions in a negative and unbalanced light. Granted, this is largely for comedic effect and it is somewhat successful on that score. But as a result of all this Harry and his mother might be the only two characters in the film who are not thoroughly nauseating.

As mentioned previously, Black Sheep is not shy about the gore. It may not be as out there as some of the other "Dimension Extreme" films (the Feast trilogy comes to mind), it still has its fair share. This includes violence against humans as well as sheep, and creatures that are somewhere in between. Naturally animal abuse isn't cool and is generally looked down upon these days, so the violence against sheep is campy enough to ensure the viewer that it's not real. In fact, real sheep and what appear to be animatronic sheep are both used throughout the film at different times.

There's nothing to do in a movie about carnivorous mutant sheep that embrace the ridiculousness of the concept and run with it. That's exactly what Black Sheep does, and on that score it is an amusing and grisly success.

3 shears out of 5
Rated R for adult content, nudity, graphic language, graphic violence.

Splice (2009)

She's not human... not entirely.

A pair of rebellious scientists, who also happen to be a couple, secretly take their groundbreaking scientific research to a new level against the orders of the employer who wants to redirect their focus to creating profitable commodities from their existing research instead of pushing it forward in the hopes of new exciting discoveries.

But their work takes an unexpected turn when their human-animal hybrid experiment, which they had intended to abort before it came to term, develops at an alarming rate and is born. The new being, which they name Dren, becomes increasingly human in appearance as it rapidly develops to adulthood.

The scientists, forced to hide their illegal and unsanctioned experiment, begin to take Dren on as their own daughter. But is she as she seems?

Splice is a genuinely different movie, that much is true. It isn't particularly scary or suspenseful, but different it certainly is. Over-all, not a bad movie. It does keep the viewers interest because its hard to guess what bizarre or disturbing turn of events will happen next as Dren matures and goes through a variety of interesting changes and mood swings.

The movie also plays around with the ongoing debate about the morality of certain scientific fields. While not actually mentioned specifically, stem cells come to mind. The movie doesn't make a definitive statement, but it seems to come out on the irrational, anti-science, side of the argument. However, according to writer and director Vincenzo Natali, this was never the intent of the movie and in fact it is only meant to be a cautionary tale about the need for the mature and careful use of such technology.

Either way, Splice was ultimately an enjoyable film which was good, but maybe not amazing. It also ended with a huge open door for sequels: sequels which will surely have no hope of being as good as the original film and, if produced, will undoubtedly be primarily action films and will lose the edgy, messed-up, drama of the original.

3 blob fights out of 5
Rated R for disturbing elements including strong sexuality, nudity, sci-fi violence and language.

Watch the Splice trailer.